I took Stacy, Alex and Jessie to the March for Life in Washington, DC earlier this week, Morgan and Jason both came down with the flue with temperatures of 103 so they were unable to travel. We went with kids from Divine Child and Brick, maybe 45 kids, 8 adults and we were hosted by Bishop O’Connell High School along with another 500 kids from Boston. They had the Blessed Sacrament exposed for Adoration which was nice after 10 hours in a bus. A pizza party followed and the kids then played basketball in the gyms until lights out. Monday morning we went to the Basilica and Fr. Andy said Mass for us in the Our Lady of the Rosary Chapel. We also toured the Basilica and I found the Our Lady of Lourdes grotto and the Crypt Church really resonated with me. I spoke with a few of the sisters of Mary, Mother of the Eucharist at the march and they said they slept on the floor in the Crypt Church.
After leaving the Basilica we went to Arlington National Cemetery and saw President Kennedy’s grave, Senator Kennedy’s grave, saw the changing of the guard at The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier and toured The Custis Lee House, Custis being George Washington’s stepson whose only child, Mary Anna Randolph Custis, married Robert E. Lee. Lee’s refusal to fight for the North in the civil war so irritated Gen. Meigs who commanded the garrison house that he decided to turn the 1,100 acre plantation into a burial ground. Fr. Andy went to the gravesite of his cousin who was killed in action in Iraq in 2006.
We were up early on Tuesday to pack the bus and walk to the Metro to take it into DC for the March. We were at the Verizon Center at 8:00am for the Teen Mass but it was already filled to capacity so we went to St. Patrick’s a couple of blocks away and attended an overflowing Mass there. After lunch we headed to The Mall for the Rally and March which started at 2pm. It was great to see the huge numbers of young people who turned out, I would guess that 75% of the marchers were college aged or younger, pretty similar proportion to when we went 2 years ago.
We were picked at The Hyatt around 5pm and headed home. Our last challenge was the heater on the bus failing a couple of hours after we left, the cabin temperature was 42 degrees when we arrived in Dearborn at 5am., burr! All in all it was another great pilgrimage to the nations capitol in support of the most defenseless among us.
After leaving the Basilica we went to Arlington National Cemetery and saw President Kennedy’s grave, Senator Kennedy’s grave, saw the changing of the guard at The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier and toured The Custis Lee House, Custis being George Washington’s stepson whose only child, Mary Anna Randolph Custis, married Robert E. Lee. Lee’s refusal to fight for the North in the civil war so irritated Gen. Meigs who commanded the garrison house that he decided to turn the 1,100 acre plantation into a burial ground. Fr. Andy went to the gravesite of his cousin who was killed in action in Iraq in 2006.
We were up early on Tuesday to pack the bus and walk to the Metro to take it into DC for the March. We were at the Verizon Center at 8:00am for the Teen Mass but it was already filled to capacity so we went to St. Patrick’s a couple of blocks away and attended an overflowing Mass there. After lunch we headed to The Mall for the Rally and March which started at 2pm. It was great to see the huge numbers of young people who turned out, I would guess that 75% of the marchers were college aged or younger, pretty similar proportion to when we went 2 years ago.
We were picked at The Hyatt around 5pm and headed home. Our last challenge was the heater on the bus failing a couple of hours after we left, the cabin temperature was 42 degrees when we arrived in Dearborn at 5am., burr! All in all it was another great pilgrimage to the nations capitol in support of the most defenseless among us.
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